DOHA: When Walid Regragui took over the job as Morocco coach in August, just about three months before the start of the World Cup in Qatar, he made a point that the success of the team wouldn’t be possible without the happiness of the players’ parents.

He’d inherited a side fractured under their previous coach Vahid Halilhodzic, who had guided them to the World Cup but was refusing to select star winger Hakim Ziyech. Only in May, Halilhodzic had reconciled with full-back Noussair Mazraoui but the vastly-experienced Bosnian wasn’t keen on Ziyech.

The Royal Moroccan Football Federation wanted Ziyech and Halilhodzic’s refusal to budge cost him his job, opening the door for Regragui, a former defender who was part of the Morocco side that reached the final of the African Cup of Nations in 2004.

The France-born Regragui had pledged after the loss to Tunisia that he would be Morocco’s coach one day and lead them to the World Cup. Here was his chance and Morocco’s barnstorming run at the World Cup, having ousted both Spain and Portugal on their way to the semi-finals, is testament to the work Regragui has done.

“The new coach [Regragui] was able to find the words and the way to bring out the best players and make a team with the lion’s state of mind,” former Morocco midfielder Mustapha Hadji, who was an assistant to Halilhodzic, told French newspaper L’Equipe after seeing the Atlas Lions down Portugal in the quarter-finals.

“The team players with heart and an exemplary state of mind. With a coach like that, you can only flourish and work miracles.”

The mentality fostered by Regragui, though, came by one crucial step he’s taken. A part of the Moroccan diaspora, Regragui was faced with questions about including players who were not born in Morocco but in Europe.

Players like Ziyech and influential midfielder Sofyan Amrabat were born in the Netherlands. Their explosive right-back Achraf Hakimi was born in Madrid while their impregnable goalkeeper Yassine Bounou counts Canada as his place of birth.

Captain Romain Saiss and winger Sofiane Boufal are two of several born in France. All of them only qualified to play for the African country through their parents or grandparents.

To gel the most talented Moroccan squad in decades into a team and foster the patriotism among his players, Regragui and the Moroccan federation decided to invite the families of the players to Qatar.

It saw parents being invited too along with wives and children of the players. It’s been obvious in the celebrations how the strong bonds the players share with their mothers. Hakimi has been seen embracing and kissing his mother after every victory in Morocco’s historic run so far.

Boufal danced with his mother on the pitch at the Al Thumama Stadium after Morocco’s victory over Portugal. Others too have been keen to highlight the sacrifices made by their parents in helping them reach this stage.

In return, the players have sacrificed themselves for the team’s cause.

“Morocco have been one of the most compact team in the World Cup because everyone has sacrificed for the team,” Nigerian football great Sunday Oliseh, a member of FIFA’s Technical Study Group for the World Cup told reporters at a news conference on Tuesday, two days before Morocco take on their former colonisers France for a place in the final. France, the defending champions, are wary of what Morocco bring.

“They’re a united team with a unique bond,” France defender Raphael Varane told reporters on Tuesday. “We expect a difficult match in which we will have to fight till the end.”

Published in Dawn, December 14th, 2022